To learn more about how to answer and refute Protestant theology from Biblical exegesis alone, consider signing up for these courses: Answering Protestantism from the Bible (17 hrs): buy.stripe.com/dR62bz6Y467KdfGcMM Answering Calvinism from the Bible (6 hrs): buy.stripe.com/aEUeYl4PW0Nq5Ne7su Answering Protestantism from the Bible & Answering Calvinism from the Bible bundle (24 hrs): buy.stripe.com/9AQ8zX4PWeEg1wYeUY Topic list for Answering Protestantism from the Bible: 1: Why Answer Protestantism from the Bible? 2: The Arc of Biblical Theology: Creation, Covenant, Redemption, Glorification 3: How Does Christ Purchase Salvation? 4: Justification, Deification, and Imputation 5: Justification, Deification, and Imputation (2) 6: Liturgical Worship in Biblical Theology 7: What Happens in Baptism and the Eucharist? 8: Apostolic Succession, the Holy Priesthood, and the Visibility of the Church 9: The Communion of Saints: Veneration and Intercession 10: The Woman: The Virgin Mary in Scripture 11: Now Mine Eyes Have Seen: Iconography and Idolatry 12: The Biblical Doctrine of Tradition --- Michael Garten's research on pre-Nicene veneration of images can be found on his Substack: michaelgarten.substack.com/. His upcoming book will argue that image veneration was widely approved of and practiced in the pre-Nicene Church. To access all his articles and support his (self-published) book project, please become a premium subscriber of his Substack. His latest premium article makes an in-depth case that Saint Methodius of Olympus (260-211 AD) taught the veneration of images of angels: michaelgarten.substack.com/p/pre-nicene-image-veneration-4-saint To view one of Michael’s replies to a critic of our second video, see here: michaelgarten.substack.com/p/reply-to-an-objector-re-image-veneration
The notion of interactive icons, the four loaves plus the Eucharist as the fifth or the four virgins from the parable of the ten virgins, clinches it. The interactive icon concept shows that images were used in worship, even in the heart of the Eucharistic sacrifice.
Your channel is invaluable. If i wasn't scrambling to pay my utilities before they're shut off then I'd definitely contribute to your patreon and take your courses. Hopefully I'll be able to in the future, God willing. Thank you for all that you do.
I had to remove a certain commenter who has made some well-written critical comments and produced useful engagement in the past, but lost his temper. Please avoid statements that anyone involved in this debate (including statements about Dr. Ortlund, for whom I have significant respect) is arguing in bad faith. Not identifying the commenter, so please don't ask.
Hello! I'm a Roman Catholic, I've been watching your series on that topic. It's a good content. I appreciate you work on that. I'll be praying for you so that God bless your projects. Do you have any video explaining what is the christian understanding on veneration?
Thank you so much for clarifying the issue with these excellent videos. I hope that many more people will see these and come to a knowledge of the truth. It's very hard for Protestants to understand the true Christian phronema.
I do not think any of this will convince Ortlund or others like him. In my opinion the whole conversation revolves around several false assumptions and premises that need to be exposed and questioned. Also this whole obsession with pre-Nicene iconography is pointing more and more in the direction of Protestants eventually denying the Trinity.
In some ways it already has: EFS, WLC’s widely respected Logos-Mind Christology, and other’s aversion to venerating images of Christ because they somehow “only represent His humanity and not His divinity,” I wholeheartedly concur.
Yep. It’s not about historical facts or source material for these people. It’s all about their starting point with faulty presuppositions. They can’t even make the basic leap backwards to honestly and critically assess and account for their presuppositions. Best we can do is refute them for the sake of others and pray that God opens their eyes.
Interesting--I think that there's a potential problem when we raise the bar too high for what counts as evidence that the early Church believed something. A Protestant friend of mine said he didn't find the first half of my presentation very convincing. My response was this: "One way to approach this is to ask what we could reasonably expect. How clearly attested is the (entire, exclusive) NT canon before 325? Eternal generation of the Son? I think there’s plenty of evidence for these but it’s not a fireworks show that everyone will gasp in awe of, and requires quite a bit of analysis and explanation to see why the case for these is strong. But after it’s been talked through, it turns out that it’s really sturdy." I do think that when you start getting extremely scrutinizing about what can be strictly proven from the early Church it can become a kind of acid that eats away at other core beliefs like you're saying. Thanks for watching!
@@MichaelGarten Agreed. Point by point apologetics has its place for the sake of addressing particular claims and arguments, but it's ultimately not very convincing on its own, especially not to the average Protestant. All it's doing is playing into the Protestant framework of argumentation and rationalism while not offering much in the way of making it real for them on a personal level as opposed to an intellectual level. Ultimately what will deconstruct their presuppositions and lead them into Orthodoxy will need to be a revelation of not just the historicity and consistency and continuity of Orthodoxy, and not just revealing the fundamental flaws of Protestantism, but a truly spiritual experience of deep and profound meaning to that individual. Not even the most flawless and perfect argument can trump that. Because at the end of the day, it's not an issue of ideas but an issue of the heart and the state of the soul.
@@aaronwolf4211There is no tension between using reason and noetic experience. Their heart has to change, sure, but you can reveal their worldviews nakedness through reason. Apologetics is also not evangelism.
This material is so important. Do you believe that here in Brazil I've heard a protestant apologist say that the early Christians were so afraid of doing idolatry that they even prevented themselves from painting the bricks of their churches? Man! When I heard that, I went crazy! I said to myself, "What! They would take the dead body of a martyr in order to venerate it, let alone paint the walls!"🤣
Early Christians such as St Augustine and St Epiphanios point to sacrifice as distinctive of worship; to sacrifice to someone/something is to treat them as a god. Other modes of honor can be just veneration
I am as much looking forward to this as I am NOT looking forward to that same Protestant guy concern trolling in the comment section of this video while ignoring the citation of Tertullian and St. Methodius like he did in the previous video.
